Haven’t read the whole thread, but has anyone mentioned that thighs are better than the breasts? 
If boneless chicken breasts were cheaper than boneless chicken thighs, why would one buy the thighs?
To me, once the meat itself has the dry texture, it’s “dry,” no matter how much liquid you surround it with. My parents do it all the time with pork loin – they cook it to death and serve it with lots of sauce and gravy. Doesn’t matter. Stuff is still dry as hell.
Now, I won’t complain – my folks are otherwise good cooks and any food anyone cooks for you is good food in my book, but overcooked lean meat still feels like overcooked lean meat no matter how much sauce you douse it in.
Sous vide is great for pork tenderloin, pork loin, and chicken breast. I cook a huge chicken breast medium rare, it’s cooked all the way through to the same degree, then give it a quick sear with a torch.
I need to try that technique. I had a friend try sous vide with some redneck jury-rigged contraption involving Ziploc bags and boiling water and results…were mixed. The plasticizers in Ziploc bags will leach into food under such circumstances.
That’s my reason- it’s hard to botch thighs, while breasts take a lot of close supervision so as to not overcook them.
That said, there are definitely uses for chicken breasts, but for stuff like casseroles, stews, etc… thighs usually work a lot better.
Sous vide devices have come down in price. And every household needs a vacuum sealer!
Actually, cooking them with the bone in makes them more flavorful.
I’ve had it sous vide, but I’m just not that sold on the technique. Perhaps I’m just being stubborn; I don’t know. I bought my brother an Anova sous vide thingamajig about five or six years ago and he’s still sous viding the crap out of everything! He even got some sort of commercial vacuum sealer at a restaurant-going-out-of-business sale.
I’m quite fine with more conventional methods of cooking chicken breast or loin. For me, that’s either a gentle poach or just a slow bringing-up-to-a-little-below-desired-temp cooking method and searing at the end. Sous vide is nice and interesting, but I just haven’t seen it as the cooking revolution everyone else seems to have. Then again, I love my Instant Pot, and I know there’s people who feel similarly about that.
I love my air fryer, even though I only make French fries in it. I make the best fries evar!!
I remember the good ol’ days where the most expensive parts of the chicken were the worst parts, the breast and going further cutlets made from the breast. Also in those days a lot of people breaded and fried those breasts, which speaks for their lack of falvor and needing something to help. Legs and thighs were where the taste is, and a fraction of the cost. Wings they couldn’t give away and were a steal. Some chinese restaurants capitalized on that by using thigh meat instead of breast meat.
While I think some people try to force too many things in the sous vide, thick steaks, chops and fish filets all come out wonderful. Better than the reverse sear, imnsho.
What you really want for cacciatore, at least according to my mother (and me), is a soup chicken, if you can find one; which may these days be difficult.
A proper soup chicken is an old hen; full of flavor, but must be cooked a long time in liquid or it’ll be too tough to chew. First, as you say, simmer in water, skin and bones included, and a good strong cooking onion (not a sweet onion) until it’s starting to vaguely think about maybe being tender some day, but isn’t really there yet. The fat (of which there won’t be much on an old laying hen) will cook out into the broth, and can be skimmed off later. You can start your cacciatore sauce while this is going on (my mother started with tomatoes etc., not with purchased sauce, so this also took a while.) Then combine sauce and chicken (you can debone the chicken at this point if you want, and I suppose skin it, though both are optional) and cook it quite a while longer in the oven, so the sauce and chicken have significant time to meld flavors.
If you try to do anything remotely like that with a modern fryer or broiler, the meat will disintegrate into mush long before the flavors are properly brought out and melded. That’s why you need a tough old bird to start with.
General Tso’s Chicken, one of the most popular dishes on NYC Chinese takeout menus…always listed under “Specials” and always commanding a premium price…is unabashedly made out of boneless thigh meat.
This sounds great, but I’ve gotten more into the 30-minute meal mode since my daughter moved out. I also work out of my home, so my schedule is very erratic. I used to enjoy cooking things that take all day and yield a week’s worth of meals, but I now favor making smaller, simpler portions I know I’ll consume with 36 hours, maximum.
WRONG WRONG WRONG!!! I only buy chicken thighs, unless I’m buying a whole chicken. I don’t think I’ve ever bought chicken breasts in my life. Breasts are dry and tasteless. Even when roasting an entire chicken, we eat everything but the breasts, then make something else from them, e.g. soup or chicken salad.
Mmm… made stir-fried chicken thighs with spinach, water chestnuts, and shiitake mushrooms for dinner tonight…mmmm…
Will probably bake the rest of them tomorrow night.
They were on sale this week really cheap where I work, so I bought three pounds.
No argument here but boneless, skinless thighs are more convenient, cook faster and still taste delicious.
Ditto.
Then you must get your chicken from here:
